Infinite Decks of the Week – Finally an OTA With Minimal Impact!

After an incredibly turbulent end of July that was followed by the return of the Move archetype to the competitive mix, this week has looked very calm. With just three cards changed in the last OTA (and honestly only one making an impact so far), the decks on the road to the Infinite rank have not felt very innovative for once. Rest assured, I still managed to find a few lists worth exploring. These tell us a little more about the direction the metagame might be headed in, or at least where one could imagine playing Forge or Crystal in the future. Still, I saw a lot of Sera Control and Good Cards decks while scrolling through the various posts about making it to Infinite.

On the menu this week, the Move synergy continues to be experimented with, and both Forge and Crystal have seen their popularity rise after the OTA (while Shanna has unfortunately remained unused). For now, neither card has pushed a new archetype to emerge. Crystal is seeing a bit of play in Silver Surfer decks – particularly Negative Surfer – while Forge is being used in a ton of decks. Archetypes like Surfer, Patriot, Destroy, and even Shuri have included the card.

For now, it seems like the big winner of the OTA is Silver Surfer, which might have caught up to Good Cards or Move in terms of power level and created a very strong trio at the top of the metagame. But the Ladder and Conquest Tier Lists are made to focus on the best performing decks, not this series. Here, we try to find the more unusual builds and celebrate their accomplishment of reaching the game’s highest rank.

Let’s dive into those different builds and see how they managed to find success during this week after punching their ticket to the Infinite rank.

Is Move Good Enough On Its Own?

Infinite Move

Created by den

, updated 8 months ago

4

4x Collection Level 18-214 (Pool 1)

1x Collection Level 222-474 (Pool 2)

4x Collection Level 486+ (Pool 3)

1x Series 4 Rare – Collection Level 486+ (Pool 4)

2x Series 5 Ultra Rare – Collection Level 486+ (Pool 5)

2.7

Cost

0-
1
2
3
4
5+

3.8

Power

0-
1
2
3
4
5+

While we call the current best deck in the game “Move Legion”, it really is two packages of cards merged together – and Move is only one of those two. As such, Move has never been alone at the top of the mountain; rather, it amassed enough cards to become one of the excellent packages you could include in various shells, just the same as Darkhawk and the Rocks.

Lately, The Phoenix Force has started to pick up some momentum, as well as Magneto as a strong 6-Cost card. This shows that Move might be more than just Silk, Jeff the Baby Land Shark, and Captain Marvel. With this deck shared via private message, Benjamin Roller took the extra step and went all in on Move – he even included the often forgotten Vulture, Dagger, and Heimdall. Angela remained included, although Kitty Pryde is not anymore, and Beast rounds out the deck to offer some combo potential through bouncing Dagger, Ghost-Spider, and Iron Fist back to hand.

Last month, Benjamin sent me a similar deck that had Polaris and Cloak replacing Beast and Spider-Man in the deck above. It doesn’t seem like many other players have caught on to it, but we can at least appreciate his consistency and commitment to the Move synergy.

The Old Staples are Coming Back

Annoying Move

Created by den

, updated 8 months ago

2

2x Collection Level 18-214 (Pool 1)

2x Collection Level 222-474 (Pool 2)

4x Collection Level 486+ (Pool 3)

1x Series 4 Rare – Collection Level 486+ (Pool 4)

3x Series 5 Ultra Rare – Collection Level 486+ (Pool 5)

2.7

Cost

0-
1
2
3
4
5+

4.1

Power

0-
1
2
3
4
5+

Jeff the Baby Land Shark, Silk, and Kraven have teamed up to become the latest Good Cards package that focuses on points and being able to reach any kind of location. However, the best cards in the Move synergy have historically been the ones moving your opponent’s cards – particularly Aero and Magneto, both of which were staples at different times in the past year.

It seems like Spider-Man is slowly building itself a solid reputation in that regard. He’s been slowly replacing Polaris in a lot of decks, and Magneto‘s daughter was regarded as a top tier 3-Cost card for a very long time.

When you mix both of these Move elements, you get points, flexibility regarding the locations, the ability to reposition some of your opponent’s cards, and, it seems, a very solid backbone for a deck. This is exactly what Jeb Calis did, completing the deck with various solid standalone cards like Spider-Ham, Armor, Shang-Chi, Nebula, and Sunspot.

In their own words, the list feels very flexible, which is easy to believe as we can see a little of everything (and barely any cards seem to have their power reduced for their ability). As such, the mix of both Move packages right now seems like a great place to start to building a deck. Then, you can either take the points direction with Angela and Kitty Pryde, which leads to the current best performing deck in Marvel Snap, or slot in more disruptive cards and have a deck that aims to cancel the opponent’s ability to develop freely once you got your points installed on the board.

Is Crystal a Good 3-Cost Card Now?

Infinite Surfer

Created by den

, updated 8 months ago

3

11x Collection Level 486+ (Pool 3)

1x Series 5 Ultra Rare – Collection Level 486+ (Pool 5)

2.8

Cost

0-
1
2
3
4
5+

2.8

Power

0-
1
2
3
4
5+

I don’t think anyone would argue that Silver Surfer isn’t a solid archetype. It’s easily among everyone’s top ten, and likely in a lot of top fives. As such, seeing the deck perform well and reach the Infinite rank is no surprise at this point. Instead, the important question to ask ourselves here is about Crystal: does the card deserve one of the deck’s precious twelve spots?

Finding Sera and Silver Surfer on time, alongside Shadow King or Rogue for specific match ups, can be absolutely key to the deck’s success. In that regard, a little help in drawing an extra card might be welcomed, even if it means the opponent gets one too. However, including Crystal means getting rid of Storm, or Killmonger, or only running one 2-Cost card (when Forge is pretty hot right now alongside Brood), or not including Absorbing Man. The list of cards deserving of that spot is quite long, so Crystal making it into the deck could be a testimony of the impact her change had.

One thing to keep in mind, though, is what happened last month with Jean Grey and Nakia. Both cards saw extensive play in the archetype, and nowadays they’re a complete afterthought. I’m not saying Crystal will follow the same path, and I’m really happy to see the card in decks and finding some success since that is exactly why OTA balance patches exist in the first place. It is simply a reminder that we should always give it a bit of time before reaching a definitive conclusion about the impact of a change.

Good Cards Strays Further From Darkhawk

Good Cards Infinite

Created by den

, updated 8 months ago

3

4x Collection Level 18-214 (Pool 1)

1x Collection Level 222-474 (Pool 2)

5x Collection Level 486+ (Pool 3)

2x Series 4 Rare – Collection Level 486+ (Pool 4)

3.1

Cost

0-
1
2
3
4
5+

2.8

Power

0-
1
2
3
4
5+

Even after Zabu was nerfed from being the best card in Marvel Snap to just a great 2-Cost card, its alliance with Darkhawk has remained the foundation of the Good Cards archetype for the last six months. This season, with Move emerging and using Angela and Kitty Pryde as its source of extra points, we are seeing decks with more room to work with. We went from four cards, typically five with Iron Lad, down to two as the “core” of Good Cards. Whether removing Zabu is a good idea or not remains debatable, as the deck still packs three 4-Cost cards even without Darkhawk and Rockslide.

Nevertheless, it doesn’t seem like this kind of deck lacks any kind of points. It has a points duo early in the match (Angela, Kitty Pryde) and one for later in the match (Stature, Black Bolt). This allows the archetype to keep its signature flexibility during the mid-game, where cards based on a lot of points (Shuri, Taskmaster) mix with flexible options (Captain Marvel, Hulkbuster) and tech cards (Shang-Chi, Spider-Ham).

Similar to Crystal in Silver Surfer, it is probably too early to say which take is the absolute best for the deck. I believe you could go either way and end up with a fantastic build no matter what. Still, this is further proof we truly are in the era of the flexible decks. There are a few general archetypes dominating, but they can showcase such vastly different lists that they feel like entirely different decks at times.

Closing Words

Apart from Silver Surfer strengthening its position with Forge and Crystal seeing some experimentation, as well as Forge joining multiple archetypes to buff Brood, Daken, and anything else worthy of it, the Marvel Snap metagame has not seen any new archetypes rise to shake up the status-quo at the top of the rankings yet.

However, one thing to note is that if the rich got richer, they also got much more flexible. Move, Good Cards, and Surfer can all include twenty cards in their lists depending on how they want to build their points and which opponents they decide to focus against. As such, the archetype diversity could be lower after this patch, as the buffed cards really seem to only be explored in the decks that are already solid. Those cards are also joining a very long list of strong tools that can be used in order to craft the perfect build and adapt to the environment.

With that in mind, I anticipate the climb to the Infinite rank to be based on who will understand these decks the best in order to find an edge over their competition. Whether you have that sleeper card to beat the mirror match, found a play pattern that is only unlocked if you play a certain way, or have a better Snap and Retreat game, climbing to Infinite will lie in the small details this season.

I wish you the best of luck on your quest towards the game’s highest rank. If you need anything, be it a question related to this piece or a coaching inquiry, you can find me on the Marvel Snap Zone community Discord, or follow my Twitter page where I share decks and biased opinions about the game.

Good Game Everyone.